The Zen of Freestyle Interviews by Monty Little It s after 1:00 a.m. in Southern California. The silence of a still warehouse is suddenly broken with the hum of fluorescent tubes, bathing the concrete floor below with light. A lone figure turns on his ipod and starts skateboarding to the music, practicing flips, pogos, rail slides, spins and flatground ollies a move he introduced to the world. The skater is none other than Rodney Mullen, who has adhered to this practice regimen for years, skating privately in the dead of night. Like-minded skaters around the world also seek solitude when practicing their chosen discipline of skateboarding: the often lonely world of freestyle skating. What exactly makes these guys tick? Where is the zone that they mentally drift into as they practice highly technical tricks for hours on end? For Mullen and his followers, freestyle skating is a form of contemplation; the peace they achieve while skating is sometimes called the Zen of freestyle. This is the first in a series of articles in which we ll take an intimate look into the lives of six of the world s top freestyle skaters.
Shen Dominic Meng, 37, China p.m., I have a cup of coffee to wake me up, then I go to a quite park near and practice skateboarding for three to four hours. What is so special about freestyle that drives you to put in these long hours of practice? When I m skating, it s like I m creating art, perfecting each trick and making it flow beautifully, such as spinning 14 consecutive nose 360s. I hope that people will not only enjoy watching my skating but that it will inspire young skaters to take up freestyle. Are you a practicing Buddhist? I m not an actual Buddhist, but I do believe in Buddhism. I m not a Christian, but I believe in God. One of the things that I ve learned from Buddhism is meditation, which I do often. The peace I find when I meditate is similar to what I feel when I am skating; it s very calming. Dominic lives in Beijing, China s capital, where he was a designer for the Kempinski Hotel until 2013, when he quit to devote all his time to freestyle skating. In March 2014, Dominic emailed me asking for help in obtaining his Canadian visa so he could travel here and compete at the World Freestyle Round-Up. What transpired in the following months is nothing short of a miracle. Monty: Beijing s population is over 11 million. Are there many freestyle skaters in China? Dominic: No, I think I m the only one, so it was very frustrating because there was no one to learn from. After five years of skating alone, I finally dropped it and took up trail bike riding. How did you make the transition from skateboarding to trail bike riding? I d been riding a bike since I was little, so it came to me very naturally. In fact, I became number one in China, competing in many X Games, but after about six years of competing, I decided to return to skateboarding, which was my real love. I ve watched a video of you performing tricks on your bike. How did learning skateboard tricks compare to this? Every freestyle trick that I know I learned from watching videos on websites. My day is like this: I wake up at 6 a.m. and head off to work. When work ends at 6
Last year, you asked me to write a letter to the Canadian Consulate in Beijing, hoping that this would help you receive a Canadian visa. Please tell us what happened. I printed your letter and took it to the visa office that very day but was denied my visa a second time. I was very depressed. Rodney Mullen heard about what had happened and emailed me. He is my idol, so I was very humbled to hear from him. He told me that the single event that changed his life was the Oasis Pro freestyle contest in San Diego, California [in 1980]. He was only 14 at the time, lived in Florida, had neither the money for a plane ticket nor permission from his parents to go, but he still found the means to get there. The rest of his life changed from winning that single contest. He encouraged me to do everything I could to get to Canada because he wanted me to achieve my dreams after devoting so much of my life to them. His email must have inspired you because the next thing you did was write a letter to Stephen Harper, the Canadian Prime Minister. I didn t know if that was a good, bad or stupid idea (laughing). But I sent it anyway, and you sent a letter too, which resulted in my Canadian visa being approved on April 18, 2014, a day I ll never forget. Not only did my dream come true of being able to compete at the 2014 World Round-Up, my very first contest, I also got to meet and skate with the world s best freestyle skaters, and was able to go back and do it again in 2015. Thank you, Dominic, for sharing your story with us. It is an inspiration to other skaters who also want to achieve their dreams.
Albert Kuncz, 29, Hungary Albert recently bought an apartment in the town of Veszprém, about 90 minutes outside of Budapest. He graduated as an IT administrator and works as a cybersecurity guard. Monty: Seeing you skate in person at the Round-Up, I could tell that freestyle is something very special to you. Albert: It s a way to express myself, almost an art form, in which there are no rules or teachers to enforce them. You could ask five skaters to all do the same trick. Technically, they re all going to look the same, but each skater is going to feel something different inside, which translates into their own unique style, and style is one of the most important things in freestyle skateboarding. When putting a routine together, I m really conscious of style. I try to make it unique by mixing up my tricks, with footwork, rail tricks and flips, all in one long line without stopping. Mentally, where do you go when you re skating? When I m practicing a new trick, I m totally focusing on what I have to do to land it. But when I m just skating for fun, I just open my mind and see what s going to come from my body. My feet just seem to know where to go next, bang-bang-bang, one trick after another. Sometimes I don t even know what the next trick will be, it just happens. to show myself that I can do it. Sure, you re going to make mistakes, but making mistakes often shows you the way to complete new tricks. I stick with it until I can land it. I hope I m never one of those weak people who give up and tell themselves they can t do it. You live in Hungary, but at the World Round-Up in 2013 you represented Slovakia. Why? I want you to imagine that you live in a country that gives over 90% of all sports funding to one sport and that is football (soccer). We have so many talented athletes in swimming (Katinka Hosszú), canoe, handball, water polo, BMZ (Benjamin Shenker), freestyle BMX (Adam Kun), snowboarding, and so on, but they don t receive any support from the Hungarian government. This is one of the reasons that so many good athletes are leaving the country or perform for other countries. That s why I represented Slovakia when I came to Canada. I care more about the sport than which flag I am holding. The World Round-Up is billed as a world-class skateboard contest, but what is it that really draws skaters like you to travel so far at your own expense? I ve been to several international Your flowing skating style reminds me of Henry Candioti. I can only imagine how many hours you have must put into practicing those tricks. Honestly, I do it because of the challenge,
Photo: Daniel Dutkai Photo: Daniel Dutkai contests, but I don t go there because of the competition. I go there to spend time with my friends who influence each other with our skating styles and exchange what s on our minds. I remember the first time I went to Paderborn; I just sat there for hours watching these famous skaters I d seen on YouTube. When I finally went out to skate, they came up to me because they recognized me from YouTube. We became friends instantly. That s what makes it so different from other sports. Take the X Games: Just try going up to one of the pros to talk with them it just isn t going to happen. Yet at any freestyle skateboard contest, the world s best amateurs and pros will gladly chat and even skate with you. You mentioned that you weren t able to afford to go to the Round-Up this year because you were going to take your parents to see the ocean near Fiesa, Slovenia. My mother is a cashier and my dad works for the military in the small village of Öskü, about five hours from the ocean. They ve lived there most of their lives and had never seen the ocean, so I wanted to treat them to a vacation by the sea. Having their priorities in check is something that has always impressed me about the freestyle community. Albert, be sure to send us a photo of your parents wading in the ocean, and we hope to see you next year!